How Barcelona beat Real Madrid in Spanish Supercopa with long balls and the perfect press

If you visit Rio Ferdinand’s social media accounts, you’ll discover him sharing a clip from Sunday’s Spanish Supercopa final, in which Barcelona dismantled Real Madrid 3-1 to win Xavi’s first Camp Nou trophy as a coach. The world-class former Manchester United sweeper announces, “The Xavi impact is here. I know what this feels like. Respect,” adding a series of distraught, crying emojis.

He’s referring to an undulating 44-pass move that included every single one of Barcelona’s players while the the Blaugrana are 3-0 up with 14 minutes left. ESPN’s own Steve McManaman (a former Blanco himself) yelps: “Madrid aren’t even laying a glove on them!” The metronomic, shuttled possession ends only when Rodrygo, understandably frustrated, scythes through Sergio Busquets for a foul.

The inference is that Ferdinand recognises and empathises with what Carlo Ancelotti’s men in white were going through. After all, he himself lost two Champions League finals in the space of 24 months to Pep Guardiola’s Barca, who, as Sir Alex Ferguson memorably put it, would “pass you to death.”

The irony, though, is that for the rest of the match particularly in some of the ways Barcelona picked apart the tired, sluggish Spanish champions was a very distant cousin of that Guardiola side. Put frankly, several of Xavi’s clever ideas would have been completely forbidden under the stern, philosophically unbending man who’s now in charge at Manchester City.